Family Painting
by niyuu
Summary: Tsuna paints pictures that seem to hold entire worlds, and one day he paints a family who is missing their most beloved member. Oneshot
(no mafia)

Sawada Tsunayoshi is an artist.

When he was younger, he was bullied and isolated - so he would stay by his mother's side, hiding behind her skirts, and learned to wander the world quietly and unobtrusively. he would leave a water bowl for strays, but never try to pet them - they probably didn't want him petting them. He would admire flowers, but never pick them - he'd just ruin them. he'd find quiet places stare up at the sky nearby other children so his mom would be happy, but he wouldn't try to talk to them - they probably didn't want him playing with them.

He draws pretty pictures that make his mother smile.

It made him happy - to draw, to paint, to _create_. To know he could hold a pristine piece of paper in his hands - stain it with his heart, mind, and _soul_ \- and have it _mater,_ be _worth something_ , be _the reason someone_ _ **smiled.**_ Tsuna dedicated himself to his artwork - _because surely, if i can create something with worth, i can't be completely worthless?_ \- and as he grew he quietly, unobtrusively, _flourished._

Tsunayoshi painted pictures out of his apartment, and though he was never famous, the people who bought his pieces loved their paintings wholeheartedly and always - _always -_ smiled. They claimed it was as if Tsuna had created a whole world just for them and given them a window into it, something to anchor them and help them feel safe, happy, whole, and _home_. Tsuna always feels accomplished and proud, even as his cheeks and eyes burn from the praise and becomes more determined than ever to put everything he has into his next painting.

He doesn't think much about it at first, when he wakes up suddenly gasping for breath swearing that somewhere hidden in the buzz in his ears someone had called - was calling - his name. Tsuna has a kitten mewling at him, plants to water, paintings to finish. There's a picture he wants to paint that just wont articulate itself in his mind, but he can feel that it'll be something special, so he focuses on the feeling he wants to create and keeps trying. The dreams persist, and he's startled to realize that they're getting clearer and clearer - and are full of people and that _feeling_ he's been trying to capture in his painting.

Tsuna knows that this is the picture he's trying to make, this is the world for which he wants to form a window, this is the creation he want's to _pour his soul into_. Before now he very rarely adds people to his pictures - usually the main focus is nature; the bright blinding sun filtering through the leaves of a golden valley, the rain falling to the ocean from the stars as if they were shooting stars themselves - but these people seem seem just as vibrant, have just as much strength of will as the forces of nature in his paintings, and he knows that they embody the world he is creating. During the day he paints, using canvas after canvas to try and capture this wonderful world, and at night he has strange dreams of people he's never met.

But every time he tries to draw the people in his dreams, it comes out wrong.

Their smiles seem strained, their eyes almost pleading, and the newest pictures always seem to be filled with desperation and a painfully kind _understanding_ while the older pictures always seem empty, their subjects doll-like. Tsuna feels unease when he sees them, as if it hurts some part of his soul to see these people - characters? **_People_**. - with their eyes empty of life and their smiles empty of warmth. He's filled with a determination - no, a _need_ \- to do everything possible to will these people who dwell within his canvases to life. Over the course of days, weeks, months, he tries to draw them like a man possessed, his health deteriorating, but every time he fails - getting more and more distraught.

One day, he becomes desperate. Using his last canvas - a large one that takes up the entirety of his east facing wall, directly opposite the glass doors of his balcony that has the most beautiful view of the sunrise and turns the entire apartment golden in the morning - he decides to paint all of the strange, wonderful people together.

he works late into the night, eyes crazed, every visible inch covered in paint that smears him every color of the rainbow and makes his hair stand on end with a golden orange right above his forehead - and slowly but surely each person takes shape, until there's nothing more he can add.

But there's still something missing.

They stand tall - bright, happy, and proud - full of life and radiating relief and acceptance. But in the middle of the group of people - people he knows, he swears he does - is a gap, as if someone is missing. This world is missing it's center, the force that holds it together, and will never be complete until that final piece of the puzzle slides into it's rightful place. He scours his thoughts, combing through every memory of every dream he's had, trying to remember the final person to make the family complete.

The eyes of the people - no, no, the **_Family_** his own mind corrects him - watch him fondly, as if amused he can't find the answer. The only other person in the dreams, the only person with a place in the dreams besides the ones watching him from the canvas was…

"…Me." he breathed, eyes slowly going wide, tears blocking his vision before twin streams run down his cheeks. His knees buckle.

He can hear them now, calling to him, chiding him and asking what took him so long. His breathing starts to slow, and with each exhale the voices become clearer and the world around him seems to fade.

Finally, he can hear them perfectly. He can see them, smiling, and they're holding out their arms to him.

He smiles.

Sawada Tsunayoshi is found in his apartment, surrounded by half finished pictures, and his greatest masterpiece finished in front of him. It is a picture of himself, surrounded by a strange group of people all smiling brightly from the canvas.

* * *

 **This was originally a prompt a wrote for Katekyo Hitman AUs on Tumblr, and goes by the same name. The inspiration for this AU was the piano version of _Leia_ by Megurine Luka. I think Kran/Miku-tan's translation tells it best: **

_"Flowing from the depths of my own heart is, Love that I had etched upon its surface / Deep in this illusion, I can hear you, But your voice is at its furthest_

 _If there is a form so I can touch it, If it breaks apart from all the sorrow / Then I do not need to have my eyes here, Hold me tight and don't let go_

 _(...) If there is no way of making proof that, We were once together in this world, then / Burn my body up into black ashes, End my life and say goodbye"_


End file.
